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Parteek Bansal Vs State of Rajasthan & Ors.#supreme court #highcourt #law #498A IPC #Judgement #legal

The supreme court overturns High courts dismissal in cruelty case: A legal analysis

 CASE TITLE- Parteek Bansal Vs State of Rajasthan & Ors.

CASE NUMBER- Criminal Appeal No. Of 2024 (Special Leave to Petition (Crl.) No.2520 Of 2017)

DATED ON- 19.04.2021

QUORUM- Honourable Justice Vikram Nath

FACTS OF THE CASE

The marriage was solemnized between the appellant and respondent no. 3. The respondent No.2 and No. 3 filed a complaint at Police Station Section 498A IPC etc. In the first FIR along with the appellant other family members were also roped in. appellant filed a petition under Section 482 Cr.P.C. before the Rajasthan High Court for quashing of the second FIR. The High Court has dismissed the said petition. Aggrieved by the impugned order, the present petition was preferred before this Court. The Trial Court further records that prosecution tried its best to secure the presence of the complainant and the victim but they did not turn up to depose before the Court. Left with no alternative, the Trial Court proceeded to close the evidence of the prosecution and after recording the statement of the appellant under Section 313 Cr.P.C., proceeded to hear the counsel for the parties and record the finding of acquittal.

LEGAL PROVISIONS

• Section 498A, Indian Penal Code.
• Section 482, Code of Criminal Procedure.

CONTENTIONS OF THE APPELLANT

Learned Counsel for the appellant has drawn attention to both the complaints, the judgement of acquittal as also the errors apparent on the face of record in the impugned order regarding both the grounds, that the complaint at Udaipur was prior in point of time than that at Hisar, and secondly that the Rajasthan Police had no knowledge of the proceedings at Hisar.

CONTENTIONS OF THE RESPONDENT

Learned counsel for the respondents, both the State of Rajasthan as also the complainant, have vehemently argued that the Court at Hisar had no territorial jurisdiction as the offence had been committed at Udaipur, and therefore, the judgment of acquittal delivered by the Hisar Court was void.  The complaint ought to have been examined and investigated by Rajasthan Police, but owing to the interim order passed by this Court the investigation has not proceeded as such the petition deserves to be dismissed.

COURT’S ANALYSIS AND JUDGEMENT

The court analyzed that the High Court fell in error in dismissing the petition of the appellant. The respondent Nos. 2 and 3 had been misusing their official position by lodging complaints one after the other. Further, their conduct of neither appearing before the Trial Court at Hisar nor withdrawing their complaint at Hisar, would show that their only intention was to harass the appellant by first making him face a trial at Hisar and then again at Udaipur. The appeal was allowed by the court and the impugned order passed by the High Court was quashed, and the impugned proceedings registered as FIR was quashed with costs of Rs. 5,00,000/- (Rs. Five Lacs Only).

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Judgement Reviewed By- Shreyasi Ghatak